[SPOILERS] Woden and ljubljana like boats

[Woden]

Turn 172-Vikings cont.
Rough turn, I didn't quite have enough to kill the ironclad, or didn't get any lucky rolls...
   

The good news here is that I initially had better odds against the ironclad (103 vs 102), so it will be really hard for him to kill any of mine. Other good news, I was able to land in Australia with my lead berserker...
   

I killed a quad and caravel. The frigate was just out of reach and I think he is just out of your reach but he is going to have to chose to attack the berserker and die or retreat into the city. The berserker should be fine either way. He should have a defensive strength of 85 versus ranged attack and a base frigate attacks at 55 and a crossbow at 40. I should be able to 1-shot the crossbow next turn. 

The Enlightenment finished this turn and I dropped bastions and the trade route policy for Press Gangs and Serfdom. I was able to pillage a quarry on Russia's southern island for enough faith to buy 2 builders. I did 4 chops into ironclads and one finished this turn, 2 will finish next turn, and the fourth will finish in 2 turns....
   

I should have enough gold next turn to buy the spice at Loki and chop out another ironclad. Then, at the former English capital, I will get 2 jungle chops and another ironclad in 2 turns. The builders I bought this turn will need a few turns to get into chopping position but I should at least 4 fleets by Linear A/B in about 5 turns with more in route. Production wise, Loki, Thor, and Odin can get an ironclad out every 4 turns. I think it is about 5 turns for a few of the English cities and 6 turns for a bunch of other cities. I think we should be doing pretty good with a steady stream of reinforcements coming out.

Edit: Can you send me 20 gold just in case Russia pillages something and I don't get enough to buy the tile I need?

[ljubljana]

Turn 173 - Phoenicia

To start the turn, we have some actual good news - our alliance leveled up! That is worth a badly-needed 15% hammers on units, shaving a turn off a few Pike/Shot builds right as we need it most.

I also sent you 100 gold and my excess niter. I will need 330 gold to upgrade my frigate, but couldn't get there this turn - if it looks like he's in range to go for for Cuneiform next turn, we should probably pool gold to upgrade the frigate.



The impact of lacking coal on ironclad strength is far more severe than I thought, at a whopping -20 CS! We definitely need to power this unit or it will fail to make any kind of an impact at all - it is worse than a caravel right now! But I did have some caravels in range to obliterate this galley, which is nice as it freed up a ship in the west that was playing zone defense for it in case it tried to pillage our harbors.

And the headline piece of baffling, terrible news



I merged my ironclad fleet, but got no CS boost! WTF is going on here? Do you have any idea what might have caused this? I am wondering if perhaps unpowered units secretly, undocumentedly do not count for the purposes of CS strength, and we are now finding out at the worst possible time. If you don't know what the problem is, please send me a few coal on your turn just in case it's something like that. I might also try moving it into a city next turn just to power-cycle the CS strength calculation algorithm? Idk, I'm really out of ideas here so hopefully the answer is obvious to you.

If this doesn't get straightened out between turns, it will cause us to take 2 turns worth of damage at both Abugida and Abjad, which equals one turn of life on the walls, which equals 2 Russian frigate fleets. What a disaster

On to my imminent demise:



Another great example of Civ6 unit pathfinding here . I am quite confident that I cannot move to the pinned tile, but I sure wish the game was right about this for once. Instead, I moved SE towards you - Russia will never let this unit reach one of my mainland cities ever again, and easily has the ships to block it from doing so forever. I might as well start its journey to Geneva now, which it at least does have a chance of reaching in time to help vs Australia.



Managed to kill one unpromoted caravel fleet with the Abjad city shots, and one Embolon single caravel up north with a swarm attack. I could maybe have gotten the ironclad fleet by Abjad if I threw all my attacks at it, but it didn't look guaranteed, and if I did that, he would just upgrade one to replace it that would have Embolon. Didn't seem worth taking the chance of missing a kill to me.



I can waste Marshall Mathers LP next turn if it doesn't build walls, and probably even if it does too lol. Where to then? I'm thinking Scum Fxxx Flower Boy looks like a good choice, it is reachable in 2 turns (barely) by my lead group of ships plus the one with 3 range. It should be very hard for them to defend with what looks to be almost no navy south of the channel.

[Woden]

Hopefully the missing DS on cities is just a UI bug (have seen before) but might be due to lack of coal. I will send whatever I have left after chops and will continue to send it as long as I can.

I say we have you sail south to SFFB. My best guess is that his navy is hanging out west of TMMLP, waiting to get you in open ocean where he might have a chance of surrounding you. If we go south, we can hit his backlines and take the cities along his southern coast, then I can use my berserkers to take the cities along the northern coast. As for TMMLP, you can remove all its health but I want to pillage the mine before we take the city. I will probably even leave the crossbow alone if I need to. I say our best strategy here will be to control the narrows with a small detachment and use the rest of your and mine navy to pillage and take cities along the southern coast. There looks to be some nice, juice pillage targets down there to give us much need gold, faith, science, and culture.

[Woden]

Turn 173-Vikings-start
Here is what it looks like at the beginning of the turn...
   

Williams482 has decided to engage me instead of running away. I can kill the 2 eastern ironclads and still have a line of defense so he can surround me. He also looks to be heading south with his Cossacks, most likely heading towards my GP so I can't faith buy units.

[Woden]

Turn 173-Vikings cont.
I was able to kill 2 ironclad fleets and redline a few other boats. Hopefully they are out of the action instead of gaining a promotion. I also think I have a set up where my lines should mostly hold...
   

I might lose the half-health ironclad fleet and maybe the privateer but that should be it. I am thinking of pulling back next turn to see if I can get him to follow. Because if he has most of his ships following me, they are not attacking your cities. Plus, I sent the new ironclads out of Loki south to sail east around our island to look for any sneak attack of Cossacks out of Russia's small island holdings (he did have a Cossack kill my berserker hanging around there). Also, the longer we can delay him, the better for us. He will lose his extra movement in 8 turns and if my assumptions are right, he will have a dark age and won't be able to hold any cities he captures. I did send one of my crossbows to protect my GP and campuses. He can probably 1-shot it but it will prevent him from moving. Does a lurker know how many MP an attack from a Cossack costs? I think it is 3 but not sure. Luckily, the marsh tile will also slow him down. A pillage needs 3 MP and I think he has 6 MP for those units. If he kills my crossbow, he should be able to pillage, then I can hit him with my corps crossbow and 2 city attacks. That should be enough to get the kill. I will probably need to faith buy a unit when I get some faith and I might need to switch to land units on my next civic swap and get some out fast.  

Over by Australia, I move my units into position to pillage next turn. Found a caravel at SFFB and killed it. Also, used my frigate to 1-shot a crossbow....
   

I left the frigate for you to kill. If you kill that unit and bombard TMMLP, I should be able to take the city with the embarked berserker next turn. I am set up for 2 mine pillages and a pasture next turn. Also found a couple more mines and a lumbermill in the south to pillage in a few turns.  

I sent you all my gold and 2 coal. I should be able to send 1 more next turn. I might I have a few chops to get 2 more ironclads next turn and will start 2 more. I did merge a couple of new ironclads into a fleet so I can save on maintenance. It would probably be better to keep them as single units but if I am going to make more, I need as much coal in reserve as I can get. I will hook up the coal at the northern Japanese city next turn. Depending on what Russia does on his turn, I might buy a builder at TMMLP next turn to hook that coal up but I might need the faith to buy a unit.

Edit: Wanted to add, I got out 3 ironclads this turn and I should get 4 more out next turn. Probably only get only 1 out the following turn and then 4 on T176. After that, it will depend on gold to buy choppable features and what the coal situation looks like. I figure my fleet of ironclads fight now will only last a couple more turns. The military engineer will be out next turn and will take a turn to travel before it can start placing forts, then 2 turns for forts to finish Ballistics in 4 turns. I will start a coal plant at Thor next turn and chop into it on T176. It will probably be done on T178 and we will know where Refining is located. If it is behind Ballistics, great/not so great. Great is that I can pillage the mines and campus in Australia to speed up finishing it. Not so great since I think Australia has finished Ballistics since he is on that column of the tech tree and doesn't have enough techs for it to be Industrialization and they would know where it is located and probably racing there now. Another oddity, why hasn't he upgraded his crossbows. Regardless, once we know where it is located I can pillage and hopefully get there first and start blasting his ships. We just need to hold out long enough to get there.

[ljubljana]

Sorry, yall - I have been away from home all day today and, well, I don't really think I should play the turn at 2 AM as I am feeling too sleepy to do so without making a major blunder. It looks like Australia killed my horse in the fog, with likely at least 3 units - I think we will have a choice to make between sailing south for SFFB and first striking his ships. Any thoughts on that?

In the meantime, I will play the turn first thing in the morning, after I have some coffee to make myself a little less dumb...

[Woden]

It looks like Australia killed my horse in the fog, with likely at least 3 units - I think we will have a choice to make between sailing south for SFFB and first striking his ships. Any thoughts on that?

Go south, plug the gap. If you plug the gap, you remove any advantage with numbers he has, as he can only attack with so many ships and your ships are higher quality. Also, make sure to remove all the health at TMMLP and I will take the city on my turn.

[ljubljana]

Yeah, that was what I was thinking too. Not worth engaging even with a first strike when he can surround me from the north and I do not have enough caravels to block. Playing the turn now.

[ljubljana]

Turn 174 - Phoenicia



I managed to take 40ish health off of the Cossack heading for your GP with the Abugida city shot + frigate. Probably the right choice of target, as the other is a bit too close to the Demotic farms and would just heal off the damage. Speaking of Demotic, that city finishes its walls, which I thought I was starting way too early 4 turns ago, literally just in time to prevent a Cossack attack on its unprotected city center. With just two Cossack corps in the field as of now, and my first Pike/Shot unit coming out next turn, I think I will be able to prevent any of these cities from falling. Luckily, the scattered nature of the mountains in my interior, combined with city ZoC packed in at the maximum legal density, will really help prevent the Cossacks from fully leveraging their movement advantage. It will then take just a few well-placed P/S units between some of these mountain pairs to totally cut off access to my interior. (edit: Nope, Cossacks ignore ZoC. Shows what I know. But the point about P/S still stands and should be very helpful if the situation remains stable for a few more turns.)

Speaking of which, I really question the wisdom of Russia's combining Cossacks into corps here. A corps Cossack can pillage only once per turn, and fights only 150% as well as an individual unit - I think they would do much better to take a swarm approach here to strip-pillage my lands while they still have relatively open access to them. Not that I'm complaining, of course.

Russia's move south allowed 3 of my injured caravels to escape this turn, a really nice break by my greatly-reduced standards for such things . Meanwhile, my frigates in Hieratic and Abjad are using the brief lull in the action to heal up to full. As you can see, I tried dumping my ironclad fleet into Linear A to see if that impacted the city DS strength issue at all, at which point Linear A's DS increased to what we would expect, but my other cities were not impacted. It could still be due to the coal issue, though, as the combat calculator was still showing a -20 CS penalty when I hovered over one of Russia's ships. On the other hand, though...



Clearly Russia has at least one ironclad fleet and a steady coal supply, yet they are suffering from the same issue. Their wall HP is so high, though, that looking at combat odds did not help disambiguate much between a possible UI bug and actually lower DS. I just don't understand what's going on here - Heimdall is at 83 without Bastions, which is exactly 70 base + 9 from Renaissance Walls + 4 from districts, so clearly you are getting the bonus...

Actually, here is one possibility - did you make your first ironclad fleet by combining two ironclads, or by upgrading a caravel fleet? I did the former, so perhaps the latter is actually required to update DS. We should probably consider using my next upgrade on a fleet ironclad just to be sure about this...I may be able to make that happen on my next turn if you send me your gold and a bit of coal again.

I am not sure that's worth trying, though. We need to be saving all the cash we can for battleship upgrades, as right now it looks like Russia can afford a ton of them as soon as they hit the tech (gold deficit notwithstanding) while we are nowhere close. Up to you on whether you think the chance of fixing my DS is worth potentially ending up with an ironclad instead of a battleship when you hit the tech. I'd say it is probably worth trying, but could be easily swayed on this. I am not expecting to upgrade anything else except maybe the quad in Cuneiform, though, so that we can start building up your bankroll.



Marshall Mathers is ready for capture. SFFB has Medieval Walls up, but the CS difference is so huge that it won't help much. I have three frigates in range to attack next turn, so please leave both tiles at distance 2 and one tile at distance 3 from the city open for my ships next turn. I also think you should occupy the harbor tile with your clad, if you weren't planning to already, so that he can't sail through the city center tile to hit my vulnerable frigates.

edit: As for our battle plan vs. Russia, I could go either way on retreating your clads. You would probably get one turn where Russia can hit with you with only 3 frigates if you retreat south of Heimdall/Balder and position well, but you would not do any damage next turn, and on subsequent turns they could just surround you and start hitting you with the full 9 again. It would only buy my cities an extra 2-3 turns probably, but that could be worth doing for the price of 3 free frigate shots.

Also, are you planning to use your new ships to reinforce your existing ironclad mass or start a new one? It is really a shame (and a good move by williams) that they have managed to engage our navy in such a piecemeal fashion...

[Woden]

Actually, here is one possibility - did you make your first ironclad fleet by combining two ironclads, or by upgrading a caravel fleet? I did the former, so perhaps the latter is actually required to update DS. We should probably consider using my next upgrade on a fleet ironclad just to be sure about this...I may be able to make that happen on my next turn if you send me your gold and a bit of coal again.

I am not sure that's worth trying, though. We need to be saving all the cash we can for battleship upgrades, as right now it looks like Russia can afford a ton of them as soon as they hit the tech (gold deficit notwithstanding) while we are nowhere close. Up to you on whether you think the chance of fixing my DS is worth potentially ending up with an ironclad instead of a battleship when you hit the tech. I'd say it is probably worth trying, but could be easily swayed on this. I am not expecting to upgrade anything else except maybe the quad in Cuneiform, though, so that we can start building up your bankroll.

I upgraded fleet caravels into fleet ironclads so you are probably right that combining 2 ironclads didn't raise your DS. I say we make increasing your DS a priority. Next turn, I won't have any extra coal to send you but the turn after I will send what I have. Should be enough for upgrades and a little for maintenance. Don't upgrade your quad but rather hold your gold to upgrade a fleet caravel (and make one if you don't have one already). I have 2 mine pillages on my turn and only need gold to buy a jungle tile at Official Visit. I will send the rest to you. Then, will send all my gold and coal on T175. Should be enough for a fleet ironclad upgrade. I will probably have to build start some privateers but that is okay since we reveal oil when Refining is complete and can upgrade them to subs.

Marshall Mathers is ready for capture. SFFB has Medieval Walls up, but the CS difference is so huge that it won't help much. I have three frigates in range to attack next turn, so please leave both tiles at distance 2 and one tile at distance 3 from the city open for my ships next turn. I also think you should occupy the harbor tile with your clad, if you weren't planning to already, so that he can't sail through the city center tile to hit my vulnerable frigates.

I will need the NE of the pasture so I can pillage it next turn. I can free it up the turn after. Be careful around SFFB, Russia does have a few fleets down there that my brave little archer spotted before it was killed and I am pretty sure they are still lurking around.

edit: As for our battle plan vs. Russia, I could go either way on retreating your clads. You would probably get one turn where Russia can hit with you with only 3 frigates if you retreat south of Heimdall/Balder and position well, but you would not do any damage next turn, and on subsequent turns they could just surround you and start hitting you with the full 9 again. It would only buy my cities an extra 2-3 turns probably, but that could be worth doing for the price of 3 free frigate shots.

Also, are you planning to use your new ships to reinforce your existing ironclad mass or start a new one? It is really a shame (and a good move by williams) that they have managed to engage our navy in such a piecemeal fashion...

I will have to see what he does on his turn. The only reason to retreat is to buy time and not sure if it is worth it and forgoing reducing his numbers. As for my reinforcements, I am sending the ones out of my mainland south, around our island to protect against Russia from sending Cossacks to my southern tip while my navy is engaged in the north. Anything out of former England will go towards Linear B with the hope to stop him at Cuneiform if he decides to push north around your cities. Most of the next dozen ironclads will be coming out of England, so most will be along your northern coast.

Edit: Maybe I forgo starting any new ironclads next turn and send you my coal. We should have the pillage gold for an fleet ironclad upgrade and I should have 3 coal. We do need to make it as hard as we can for him to capture your cities.